Primus Eta Lite Compact Stove Review

In 1901 a 29 year old Norwegian called Roald Amundsen, an inexperienced Polar explorer at this time, set off from the city of Tromsø, 350kms inside the Arctic Circle to test out a new herring fishing boat called Gjøa he had just purchased for a forthcoming Polar expedition.

The boat was small, much smaller than other ships normally selected for Arctic expeditions, but Amundsen had several reasons for choosing the Gjøa. Primarily her shallow draft would be able to successfully navigate through the Arctic straits that had prevented other ships, secondly they would have to survive by living off the meagre resources the land and sea could offer so only a small crew was needed and therefore a small ship was required and, lastly, it was all he could afford.

The expedition was to be the first to navigate the fabled North-West passage, a route linking the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans through the Arctic and it had defeated explorers for centuries.

Before embarking on the voyage, Amundsen used Tromsø as his base to test the ship's capabilities in the harsh environment of the Arctic Circle.

What do you pack to sit and wait on the snow?

Tromsø was my base too, but not for testing anything quite as impressive as the Gjøa. Actually let's wait and see about that...

I have brought with me the Primus Eta Lite LPG (gas) camping stove on a trip to try and get a view for myself of the Humpback and Orca whales that have recently been sighted off the coast feeding off Herring in the Arctic fjords. Obviously this far North (70 degrees) also gives a good chance of viewing the Aurora Borealis, the spectacular Northern Lights, so I was excited.

Both of these activities require a lot of patience and hanging about and, in freezing temperatures, a constant supply of soup, coffee and, of course curry flavoured instant noodles.

Back home in England you start your selection process, down jacket, snow boots, base layers, hat, gloves etc and the kit you want to take for cooking while you're out. There are loads of camping stoves on the market that use various methods to supply you with coffee and lunch but the first, unrelenting restriction on what you can take is the baggage limitations from your airline.

You can't and don't want to take anything heavy, nor can you take any fuel and if you take a liquid fuel stove, with any remnants or smell of petrol lingering around in your luggage from the (albeit empty) stove, you risk the chance that your bag doesn't arrive.

In this environment it has to be efficient. The Primus uses LPG gas canisters that screw on and off and I've checked that after landing in Norway I can get a fuel canister from the local camping shop in town. The stove is light and really compact - at under half a kilo fully fuelled and just 15cm all packed away including the gas canister.

This was, it seemed, just the ticket for the trip.

Not only do the specs add up but this stove has a number of features that make it very versatile. Included in this package is a stand to create a stable base when the stove is on the ground, a hanging loop so that you can suspend the stove if using it on rocky or sloping ground and a lid that doubles as a mug.

You're not really needing much else, as it all packs away inside a half-litre hard anodised aluminium pot surrounded by an insulated felt cover and the burner itself has a built in igniter.

Just don't forget the fresh coffee because this one also has the optional cafetiere, a screw together coffee press for a perfect brew to help keep one's eyes wide open waiting for the Aurora.

Speaking of the burner, this is the part that gets all clever. The pot has an integrated baffle that transmits the heat directly into the base so that it heats the contents pretty quick. When lit I could put my hand around the edge of the burner and hardly feel any heat escaping sideways, so it must be going up, right where you want it to go.

Operating the Eta Lite in the cold

One thing to be aware of when you get out there is the igniter, it's a very thin wire that provides the spark to ignite the gas and can bend very easily so sometimes need unbending to get a spark. Will this mean it could eventually break off? I don't know but maybe it's worth packing a lighter. It doesn't need to have any fuel in it just provide the spark in case the built in one doesn't.

The burner is specially designed to twist into the pot's integrated baffle, this makes the whole unit very stable as the flame doesn't sit exposed underneath the pot like other stoves, but sits inside the lower part of the pot protected from the wind and, in this case sideways falling snow. Even more so if you sit the gas can into the included stand.

I found that it was good practice to make sure the gas can is screwed on tightly as when your water has boiled and you want to twist off the pot from the burner, you don't want the fuel canister unscrewing instead of the pot.

The heat resistant felt cover was very good. Not only did it protect your hands from the heat but also from the cold. I was using a frozen stream to collect the water so it was very useful to prevent my skin freezing to the aluminium!

The handle detaches from the lower attaching point so that it can loop over the top for carrying or suspending the whole unit, but this can detach quite easily so be aware when pouring.

Do you have to use the integrated pot?

The handle also includes three thumbscrews, which are needed when not using the Eta Lite's pot to cook in. I would cook up noodles for lunch in a pan that I ate from and because of the way the burner is designed without a pot stand (it doesn't need one with the included pot) you cannot put a different saucepan straight onto it.

What you do is remove the small, knurled thumbscrews located in the handle and screw them into the three corners of the triangular burner. This allows another pot to be used on the stove. Although you are then not benefitting from the heat exchange technology that you bought the stove for, at least it's versatile.

I had two layers of gloves on and would have to take off the thick, leather outer gloves to use the screws (and be very careful not to drop them in the snow), but I could do it with my thinner, thermal inner gloves.

To be honest I didn't need to use the non Primus saucepan much. It was much easier to use the Eta Lite pot with its included heat resistant cover and handle and then use the stream to wash it out before finishing the meal with a freshly brewed coffee. The cafetiere side of things worked well, the rubber seal of the plunger is a tight fit and doesn't let the ground coffee pass and the lid has a pouring gap so not much to go wrong but everything needed worked as it should.

I could digress here, in fact I will because it's important.

I have tried almost every method of getting decent coffee when out in the wild, I have tried hand pumping machines that make espressos, wiry, floppy filter paper holders that can dump your coffee overboard, mini mokka pots that are too hot to handle and mesh inserts which can leave a sludge that you have to avoid sliding into your mouth like a muddy oyster on that last slurp. But I keep persevering as it's all part of the journey and I'd rather live a life inside than drink instant.

So having a built-in coffee press not only raised an eyebrow it also raised smile when it all worked perfectly and gave a consistently good two cups of fresh coffee in a very easy, hassle free few minutes.

As a Scout Leader I like a good fire and well know that feeding yourself and your party from just the sticks you have gathered and the knife, pot and maybe a fire steel you've carried, is one of the most satisfying aspects of embracing the life outdoors. Most of the time though, you can focus exclusively on doing so.

Sometimes you can enjoy the fire lighting, gathering tinder and fire wood then creating a gourmet dish over the flames, but when you are 350kms inside the Arctic Circle you just need to get hot food and drink inside you. When you want to concentrate on scanning the waters for the tail fins of humpbacks and the dorsal fins of Orcas then the Primus Eta Lite (with the essential coffee press) works well.

And did I see the Aurora? When you have a supply of fresh coffee and warming mulled wine, there just isn't an excuse to not stay up all night. Both the daytime views of the whales (I counted at least fifty Orcas and Humpbacks feeding in the same fjiord) and the night time views of the Aurora were breathtaking.

So much so that I will return to Tromsø and again, take the Eta Lite. It's now the stove I pack for adventures.